Glazed and Confused
by clagjanet
Summary: Sundance AU Series #4. Continuing from the original "What If" writing challenge, what if our intrepid Bedside Bluebell had been juggling more than one invalid when Dr. Glaser targeted the Agency? References to previous stories in the series, but you can probably get away without having read them.
1. Day 1

Disclaimer: none of these characters belong to me; they belong to Shoot the Moon Enterprises and Warner Bros to whom I am eternally grateful for the opportunity to take them out for a spin and bit of light humour.

 _Author's Note: This is a continuation of my AU series "The Sundance Stories" which was developed from a writing challenge to write a story with the premise "What if…" You may need to read the others for this one to make complete sense, but feel free to try it without!_

* * *

 **Glazed and Confused**

"Mr. Beaman? Can you hear me? Can you open your eyes? No don't try and get up. Just stay still – the ambulance is on its way."

"I don't need an ambulance." _Why would anyone think I need an ambulance?_ he thought and then opened his eyes to find himself staring fuzzily at what he thought might be the coffee shop ceiling. _Okay, that might be why_.

Despite the advice, he moved to get up, only to find a firm hand pushing him back until his head rested again on some kind of makeshift pillow.

"Honestly, what is it with you guys and always saying you don't need an ambulance?" came that laughing voice again. "Talk about your super-hero complexes."

He looked around for the source of that voice. It was a woman, kneeling on the floor beside him, dabbing a cold cloth on the side of his head. "Why does this keep happening to me?" he heard her say to herself. "Although I suppose I should be happy I'm never the one on the floor."

"I can't see," he muttered thickly.

"Oh my gosh!" said the kind voice, now slightly panicky. "You did hit your head pretty hard but I didn't think-"

"No, I mean - where are my glasses? I can't see anything without them."

"Oh!" She sounded relieved and he watched her fuzzy outline search around the floor, then blessedly, he felt his glasses slide onto his face and everything came into focus.

"I know you, you're Amanda King," he muttered up at his benefactor.

"Yes I am, and I guess it's a good sign you know that since it means you probably didn't hit your head too hard, but I have no idea how you know that because I don't think we've ever actually met."

He paused, trying to take in that extremely long sentence before saying thickly, "You talk a lot, don't you?"

Amanda chuckled, glad to see his mental faculties were still working. "That has been commented on, yes." She shifted to get more comfortable, because her legs were starting to cramp up from kneeling beside the injured agent. "Do you remember what happened?"

He concentrated for a minute, not used to the sensation of having to work for a memory. "It was Walt Kimball. The guy from Munitions? He came into the coffee shop looking like a man who'd seen a ghost and started waving a gun around. A couple of us tried to jump him but he was taking swings at all of us and I think he managed to catch me with the butt of his pistol and I don't remember anything after that."

"Well, I can tell you that part at least – he came tearing out of here, jumped in his car and took off."

"Has anyone called the Agency to alert them?"

"Yes, I'm sure at least one of the half-dozen agents in here called the office," answered Amanda, wryly.

"Ok, good," said Efraim, completely missing the light sarcasm as he concentrated. "Why does my head hurt so much? He only got in the one lucky punch."

"I imagine it has something to do with the giant goose egg you have from when you hit the floor."

"Oh." He lifted his hand to try and feel the bump she'd described only to drop it back to his side with a gasp of pain.

Amanda leaned forward immediately and began carefully feeling his arm, until she reached his elbow, where her gentle prodding provoked a yelp. "I think you may have hit this on something when you went down too."

"Ya think?" Efraim couldn't help snapping.

"Oh good," murmured Amanda under her breath. "Another easy patient." She looked up at the sound of sirens. "That'll be your ride coming now."

"I don't need an ambulance!" complained Efraim again. "I just need to get off the floor."

"Humour me," said Amanda lightly. "I'll get in trouble with Mr. Melrose if I don't make sure you're looked after. And he's already going to be annoyed that I haven't come back with his coffee."

"Fine," grumbled Efraim. He lay there, bracing for the inevitable fussing from the ambulance crew. "Why are you even here for Melrose's coffee? He gets his coffee from the bullpen machine every day at exactly 11:15."

"Well, he does when the machine is working but Fred Fielder managed to do something to it this morning and shorted out that entire corner of the bullpen. Mr. Melrose was going to come over himself but Mr. Belmont needed him for something so I offered to do a coffee run."

"Fred Fielder. Of course he did." Efraim managed to get a wealth of feeling into those few words.

"And why were you here?" asked Amanda trying to distract him.

"Avoiding…" Efraim began before lapsing back into silence.

"Francine?" guessed Amanda. "Why are you avoiding her?"

"I'm not." He peered up at Amanda through half-closed lids. "I'm letting her avoid me with dignity."

Amanda opened her mouth to answer but before she could question him further, the ambulance crew arrived and began to check him over. Amanda moved across the room and righted one of the overturned tables and pulled up a chair. She wasn't sure of the protocol, but she was pretty sure she should stick around for some senior agent to come take charge. If she'd learned anything from that day at the train station it was not to leave a crime scene. At least this time she was warm – and dressed, she chuckled to herself. She looked around the coffee shop, feeling terrible for the poor owner who was gaping at the destruction. It did look a bit like a tornado had blown through. There were another agent being checked by the ambulance crew – it seemed like he had a broken leg from the way they were splinting him but every other agent in the place had taken off in pursuit of Walt. She looked over at the sound of light cursing coming from the paramedic who was dealing with Agent Beaman.

"Ma'am, do you know this man?" asked the paramedic desperately.

"Yes, well, sort of, I mean I work in the same office," answered Amanda.

"Well, he passed out when we tried to put his dislocated elbow back and since he's a federal agent, we're not allowed to take him anywhere unconscious unless he's accompanied – security reasons, you know how it is. Anyway, we can't get hold of anyone at the number he gave us – but if you could come with these two, we can get them moving."

"I'm not really the type of person you need – I'm just a secretary." Amanda wavered, not sure what she should do, but then looked down at the unconscious agent and came to a decision. "Alright, but can you at least try to get a message back to our office to tell them where I've gone? And get someone more official to come?"

The paramedic's face was a study in relief. "Absolutely!"

"Well then, let's get going," she said.

As they walked outside, she glanced down the street towards IFF – all she could see was a sea of people and the flashing lights of emergency vehicles. She wondered if they'd managed to catch Walt yet but at least with that amount of activity going on, no one was going to miss her in the steno pool for a few hours.

Fifteen minutes and an ambulance ride later, Amanda was sitting in a small room off the Emergency department with a still unconscious Agent Beaman. Nurses came and went while she sat flipping through a year-old copy of People magazine. Fortunately there was a phone directly outside the room, so she'd been able to call the Agency and leave a message about the two agents' whereabouts and now she was just waiting for someone to come and relieve her. She was a little worried about Mr. Beaman because he kept waking up and then drifting off immediately with a light snore; she was pretty sure that bump on his head was going to turn out to be more serious than it looked. When they'd came for Agent Bledsoe to take him off for x-rays on his leg, she hadn't been sure what to do but he'd waved her off and told her to stay with Efraim.

"You don't need to look after me – my wife is on her way," he'd said. "But I don't think Beaman has anybody so he'll need company."

And so she'd sat, not really taking in anything from the magazine, wondering how long it was going to take before someone from the Agency came. Even through the closed door, she could hear the sudden ruckus out in the hall. She strained to hear but couldn't make out anything except the fact that someone was trying to shout the place down and someone else, a woman, was giving as good as she got.

"Somebody's unhappy," said a drowsy voice from the gurney.

"Mr. Beaman, you're awake! Oh thank goodness!" Amanda turned to find him blinking at her sleepily. "The nurses will be happy to see that." She walked over to the wall and pressed the call button by the door. "How's your head feel?"

"Like I got dropped on it from a great height," he murmured, closing his eyes again with a grimace of pain.

"No, no, no, don't go to sleep," said Amanda frantically, as she grabbed his hand to try and keep him from losing consciousness. The door swung open and a nurse stuck her head in. "He's woken up, but I think he's going out again."

"I'll go find the doctor," said the nurse. "Try and keep him awake." She swung the door open until it rested against the wall. "And yell if you think he's going out again."

Amanda was now rubbing his arm gently. "Stay with me, Mr. Beaman. They don't want to give you anything for the pain until they get your medical history and you need to be awake for that."

"Why are you here?" he asked, squinting up at her, pain etched on his face.

"They couldn't get hold of anyone else at the Agency to accompany you, so I got recruited. Now, do you think you can try to stay awake until the doctor gets here? You've been out of it a long time, Mr. Beaman. I was starting to worry."

"If we've been dating long enough for you to hold my hand, I think we're on a first name basis by now, Mrs. King. Call me Efraim."

Amanda gurgled with relieved laughter at that quip. "Only if you call me Amanda."

They lapsed into silence which meant that when the couple down the hall began arguing again, they could hear it fairy clearly through the open door.

"No! You are not getting up and going to look for yourself! I don't even know why you think she'd be here! Now don't move, don't get up and lie still!" There was a shriek of annoyance and then "I said don't move!"

"That's the first thing Francine ever said to me," chuckled Efraim from the bed. "If you don't count her screaming 'Get Down!' right before the gunfight started. That woman sounds just like her."

"Was it? That sounds like an interesting meeting – why don't you tell me about it while we wait?" Amanda was grasping at ways to keep him awake.

"Oh it was a real movie moment, let me tell ya. I was still with the FBI then and I wandered into the middle of her and Stetson chasing some guy down on the Mall. Shots were fired, ketchup was spilled – it was ridiculous really."

Just then, the argument began again and Efraim's eyes met hers as they both recognized the man's voice at the same time.

"She went for Billy's coffee and she didn't come back! They said Walt went there first and that they had to call for an ambulance but nobody can remember seeing her anywhere! Now l don't care what you say, if you aren't going to do it, then I am getting up and I am going to check every damn room in this hospital myself!"

"Fine! I'll go but do not make me handcuff you to the bed!"

"Mom and Dad sound mad," commented Efraim dryly.

"Yeah," said Amanda, lips quirking up. "I think I may have missed curfew."

Despite the smile, Efraim could see she was torn about staying with him. "You should probably go calm him down. I hear he's a terrible patient."

"I can vouch for that. I met him when he was unconscious and that was the last time he was easy to deal with." She couldn't stifle a giggle even as she looked longingly at the door. "He kept trying to get up too."

"It's a guy thing," said Efraim. "You know he's going to keep fighting her until you go down there right?"

"Yeah," she sighed. "But he can wait until the nurse gets back."

Just as she said that, however, a frazzled looking Francine appeared in the doorway. "Amanda! You are here! Oh thank God! Lee said you went for – Efraim!" Her eyes went wide and then dropped to where Amanda was still holding his hand. "Why are you here?"

"Getting my tonsils out," he answered laconically. "Did you bring me ice cream?"

"What?" Francine was obviously so shocked to see him that for a split second she'd taken him seriously.

"He banged his head after Walt knocked him out and he's dislocated his elbow," said Amanda with a reprimanding look at Efraim as she stood up. "Did I hear you say you were handcuffing Lee to the bed back there?

Francine dragged her gaze back to Amanda. "Uh yeah, I threatened it but he's not going anywhere – Walt tried to run him over and he's got a broken knee, we think."

"Walt tried to _what_?" Amanda headed for the door before suddenly stopping and pointing at Efraim. "Can you keep him awake and talking until the doctor gets back?" She didn't wait for an answer; she barely took in the expression of Francine's face before she hurried out of the room and down the hall in the direction of Lee's upraised voice.

"I'm not asking you for confidential information! I'm just asking you as a matter of national security to find out if she's listed as a patient! There can't have been that many of us brought in by ambulance."

"And I've already told you – there were only three agents brought in, including you, and they were all men."

"But she's not an agent, she's a civilian!" Lee's voice suddenly dropped to a wheedling tone. "Look, how about you just turn your back for a second, and I'll just go check…"

Amanda stepped into the room just as he was trying to slide his way off the gurney, and escape the frustrated nurse. "Don't even think about it, Butch! Get back up there or Francine won't be the one who handcuffs you in place!" She walked forward and pressed him back onto the raised bed. The nurse took one look at the way he was obeying this new entrant into the field and fled, with a backwards look of gratitude.

The look of relief on his face would almost have been comical if it hadn't been so heartfelt. "Oh thank God! Amanda! Where have you been? Are you alright? Why are you here?"

"I came with Efraim Beaman and Rob Bledsoe because they were hurt at the coffee shop, and I've been sitting here ever since, waiting for someone to show up and relieve me from babysitting them, only to find that someone is an even bigger baby than them!" She tried to sound stern and keep the laughter out of her voice, and apparently succeeded, although to be fair, Lee was somewhat distracted by the searing pain in his knee. "Now can you please explain to me how I can never leave you alone for five minutes without you ending up flat on your back?"

* * *

Meanwhile back in the room she'd just left, there was a strained silence as Francine crossed to sit in the chair. Efraim had leaned back and closed his eyes, the flush of embarrassment creeping into his cheeks.

"You don't have to stay, you know," he finally said, gruffly.

"Actually I do," she answered quietly. When he opened his eyes and looked at her with an inquiring expression, she shrugged lightly and went on. "Billy put in a new rule since Lee almost died from a dose of penicillin a few months back: no leaving an agent alone in the emergency room until they are either admitted or discharged."

"Oh." He considered that answer for a moment. "Well, rules are rules, I guess."

"I would have stayed anyway," she muttered into her lap, but when she looked up, Efraim had slipped back into unconsciousness.


	2. Day 2

"So I thought I only needed babysitting until I was admitted?" Efraim was confused by Amanda's appearance in his room. "And what are you wearing?" For some reason, this second question caused her to almost double over with laughter.

"It's a Bedside Bluebell uniform. I volunteer at the hospital and this fashionable outfit is what I get to wear," she finally answered, wiping her eyes. "I should have known you'd ask."

"Okay," he answered doubtfully. "So now you're babysitting me for fun in your spare time?"

"I'm not babysitting you at all," she answered. She leaned in with a conspiratorial whisper, "I'm babysitting Lee, but he's not supposed to know it. I just thought I'd come and see if you needed anything before I go over there. If I have news about you and Agent Bledsoe, it'll make him think he isn't being singled out."

"Why does he need babysitting?"

"He doesn't really – he just needs to be kept off his feet. It's ligament damage, not a broken knee, thank goodness, but if you don't keep him distracted, he tries to go find something to do. The nurses tell me that today's kick is that he's sure someone is sneaking into his room at night and he's determined to investigate it."

"Really? I've been having that dream too, but I just assumed it was nurses doing their rounds."

"It probably is nothing more than that, but he's extra tense because Billy's making him stay here and do all his annual physical stuff that he's been avoiding, which he hates. Almost as much as he hates Dr. Glaser who's doing all the testing."

"Why does he hate Dr. Glaser?" asked Efraim, suddenly much more interested.

Amanda shrugged. "I'm not sure – there's some kind of bad blood between them. Lee says Glaser did something shifty that got him in trouble, although I don't understand how bad it could have been if the Agency is still using him for their testing."

"I hadn't heard that, but he gives me the creeps. He's been sidling in here all day asking me questions as well but there's something, I don't know, just something that bothers me about him. It's like I can almost remember what it is but the memory keeps slipping away before I can get it to come into focus. It's unnerving."

"Well, we all have moments like that, where you can't think of a word or remember somebody's name."

"I don't" said Efraim grumpily. "I remember everything."

Amanda looked amused at his certainty. "Pretty full of yourself aren't you? No one remembers everything."

"I do," replied Efraim. "I have an eidetic memory and I don't forget things." He noticed her look of disbelief and went on, trying to explain it to her. "Your first day at the Agency, you were wearing a white blouse and a blue striped-skirt with a belt that had a herringbone pattern and a light blue sweater with three-quarter length sleeves and your guest pass was No. 0242."

Amanda was stunned. "We didn't even meet my first day – how did you know all that?"

He shrugged with his one good arm. "I passed you in the hallway. I see things, I remember them. It's not something I try to do, it's just something that happens." He stopped and closed his eyes for a moment before opening them again and looking at her steadily. "So when I say there's something about Glaser and I can't remember it, that's really strange."

She looked at him worriedly and asked "Have you mentioned that to your doctor? It might be a side effect of the concussion you got."

"It might be," he admitted grudgingly, "but it feels like something else. Something… external. I can't explain it any better than that." He lapsed into silence again before looking up and asking suddenly "What happened to Walt? The nurse told me only three of us were brought in so I know he didn't end up here. Did they catch him?"

He knew from the look on Amanda's face what her answer was going to be. "He died," she said gently. "After he left the coffee shop, he drove down the street to the Agency. By then, the alarm had gone out and everyone was piling out into the street and apparently he just drove straight at them. He clipped Lee and almost killed Mr. Melrose, then he lost control and ended up driving straight into the back of a garbage truck."

"So we don't know why he did it." It was a statement, not a question and Amanda could only nod in agreement. "He had a family. His wife used to send in cookies." He thumped the bed in frustration. "Why didn't he have psychological tests done? Maybe someone would have seen something! He could have been stopped!"

Amanda reached forward to grab his hand to keep him from jarring his bad arm. "Efraim! They'll figure it out! Stop being an analyst and just be a patient for a while."

"A patient patient?" he smiled wearily at her.

"I have enough impatient patients already," she laughed tossing her head in the direction of Lee's room. As she did so, she turned to see Francine staring at them doubtfully.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt anything. I just came to see how you were, I mean you and Lee. I mean I came to see how you both were and if you, um, needed anything but I guess your Bedside Bluebell has probably got you covered."

Amanda had never seen Francine look so flustered. Heck, she'd never seen Francine flustered at all and she'd been with her during an unexpected gunfight. "It's ok," she said standing up, "I need to go start my covert surveillance on Lee in case he tries to make a break for it again. I'll see you later, Mr. Beaman. Let me know if you need anything from the Ladies' Auxilliary cart." She smiled brightly at him, and left as quickly as possible but not before whispering to Francine as she passed, "If you hold his hand, it keeps him from jarring that elbow." She grinned all the way down the hall at the memory of Francine's face at that instant.

She found Lee, not trying to escape as she'd expected but poring over a pad of paper, making copious notes. He kept flipping back and forth between pages, making annotations and talking to himself. Occasionally he'd pause and rub his hand along the back of his neck, then he'd start to scribble again.

Amanda walked into the room, hands in her pockets to hide the way she was clenching them from her unease at the way he was acting. "Hey there, keeping yourself busy?"

"Yup". Lee didn't even look up to greet her.

"Making your Christmas list for Santa?" she asked brightly, trying to raise a smile.

"No. Never worked when I was a kid. Won't work now." His voice was short, and so unlike his normal warm tones that she couldn't control the shudder it brought on.

"So what are you working on so hard?" she ventured finally.

He looked up at her, annoyance written on his face. "Something is going on in this hospital and I'm going to figure out what it is. Someone is coming into my room when I'm asleep and they're trying to get something. I think there's a Soviet spy on staff and I'm going to get enough evidence that Billy will have to listen to me."

"You've mentioned this to Mr. Melrose? What did he say?"

"He says I'm just trying to get out of doing those stupid tests with Glaser but I'm not! I mean, I think they're stupid but there's something going on and it's happening when I'm asleep. It's like a dream but I know it's not but when I wake up, it slips away before I can get it to come into focus."

Amanda felt a chill come over her at hearing Lee use almost the exact words Efraim had used not fifteen minutes ago.

Lee slammed a fist onto the rollaway table he'd been writing on and Amanda jumped. "Billy's the problem here! If I could just get past him to someone who would listen to me! If he wasn't in my way, I could get some help here!"

"Lee, Billy's your friend – he'd help you if he thought something was really going on." She was trying to soothe him, unnerved by how frantic he was getting.

"But he doesn't believe it! He thinks I'm crazy and sometimes…" He stopped yelling and fell back wearily on his pillows. "Sometimes I think he's right."

"You're not crazy – you're just stressed and tired. I'll tell you what – I'll talk to Mr. Melrose and see if I can't get him to get you some help. And in the meantime, why don't you just tell me all about it."

* * *

"No, Mr. Melrose, I don't think he's just making it up. I know he sounds like he's just being his usual badly behaved self in a hospital but this is something else." Amanda was on the phone to Billy, frantic to make him understand just how oddly Lee was acting.

"He's always like this when he's deskbound or bedbound, Amanda. He starts seeing something suspicious under every rock because he's bored. Look, I have to get to my meeting with the Agency Director about this whole mess. You stay with him and try to keep him from getting too stir crazy and I'll come see him tomorrow and try and talk to him, alright? I'll talk with you soon."

"But sir, he and Agent Beaman are saying almost the exact same thing! I really think..." but then she realized she was talking to dead air.


	3. Day 3 - Day

By the end of the third day, Amanda had begun to wonder if she was the crazy one. She'd arrived to find Lee looking haggard as if he hadn't slept at all. His temper was hair trigger and he'd barely talk to her. The only good part was that he wasn't trying to escape his room anymore – all his energy was being poured into the notepads he was rapidly filling with lists and odd notations. As long as she kept him supplied with paper, she didn't need to keep watch on him like she had the last time he'd been hospitalised. That should have made her happy, but his behaviour was so erratic that it just ratcheted her anxiety higher.

Agent Bledsoe had been released so she only had Efraim to visit in between her checks on Lee. The doctors were concerned about his headaches being connected to his concussion and without anyone at home to act as a caregiver, they weren't willing to discharge him, to his obvious annoyance. He wasn't a very talkative person, but he seemed interested in how she'd ended up at the Agency and she wanted distraction from worrying about Lee so she'd told him the whole story. Hooked by her tale of accidentally becoming involved in a what she thought was a mugging at the train station, he laughed so hard at her description of taking down Soviet agents with bedpans that she strove to remember more details to add to the story. That story led naturally enough to the gunrunners at Connie Beth and their crazy leap across rooftops trying to escape.

"Oh it sounds funny now, but it was terrifying at the time," she scolded him as he laughed at her description of their Butch and Sundance moment. "We had to leave Francine alone over there and we weren't even sure where she was or how badly she was hurt."

"But she wasn't hurt. Was she?" he suddenly asked, seeing the confusion on Amanda's face.

"Well she wasn't badly hurt, but she did get shot in the arm," said Amanda. "Hadn't you heard that? I thought you two were friends."

"Emphasis on "were". But no, I hadn't heard that - I was in Dallas on training for most of last month," he answered thoughtfully. "But it does explain why she suddenly switched to wearing nothing but long sleeved shirts and blazers."

"How did you and Francine meet anyway?" Amanda asked. "You said something the other day about a gun battle on the Mall – that sounds way more exciting than my train station story."

"It wasn't as exciting but it was way messier," he said slowly. "Francine and I met when she tried to tear my shirt off." He laughed out loud at the expression on Amanda's face. "It all started with finding out my girlfriend was cheating on me on Valentine's Day and ended up with me flat on the ground covered in ketchup."

"Oh, this sounds good. Tell me all about it," Amanda settled further into her chair to hear the rest. She hadn't been friends with Francine long, but she knew that something was going on between these two. Francine had never said a thing about him, but Amanda had noticed the tiny grunts of exasperation every time Agent Beaman had abruptly changed direction when he'd run into them in the hallway or the time he'd actually turned tail and walked straight back out of the lunch room when he found them alone in there.

There was just something about Amanda, he decided later, that made you want to tell her things. He'd ended up telling her the whole crazy story of how a crushed hot dog had led to a Valentine's Day date with Francine, how an unexpected secondment from the FBI had turned into a permanent transfer to the Agency and how a speciality in Fabrication had turned into an entirely new job when Billy had realized his literal memory for detail made him an ideal information analyst. Somehow he'd even told her about the reason he was avoiding Francine – or letting her avoid him as he stubbornly continued to describe it.

"I mean, I don't even know why I'm the bad guy," he complained. "All I said was she must have missed me while I was away because she looked pale and we should go away for a weekend in Jamaica and she went all snappy and told me not to say stupid things. So I asked why it was stupid when it was the middle of November and she was bundled up in clothes like she was freezing all the time and she went all Ice Princess on me and didn't talk to me for the rest of the day. Or the next day. And then it got to be a thing and now it's been weeks."

"You didn't snap back?" Amanda's eyes were sparkling with some joke he didn't get.

"Of course I didn't. I was brought up not to argue with women."

"Well, there's your problem," she grinned.

"That's my problem? Being a nice guy?"

"She likes that you're a nice guy but she's a lot like Lee. Sometimes they just want to get ticked about one thing but they can't so they get mad at something else. The fight was about something else and if you'd snapped back, you probably would have found out what."

"Like what?"

That look of mischief went across Amanda's face again. "Information analysis is your department, Agent Beaman. I know you have all the information to figure it out." She chuckled again, "But I will tell you for free that the surest way to annoy a woman is to tell her she looks pale or tired." She glanced at her watch and sighed.

"Should you be checking in on Stetson?"

"I should be but I don't want to. He's just being such a jerk."

"Isn't he always? He was being a jerk to Francine the day I met him."

"I know what you mean, but this is above and beyond. Normally with me, he manages to keep his temper, but he's been snapping at me all day and calling me Mrs. King."

"He calls you by your name and that's a problem?"

"He's never called me Mrs. King before – so it's weird. Normally he calls me Amanda or Sundance when he's joking around, but it's like we have no history now. He talks to me like a stranger and nothing I say gets through to him." She sighed again, and went on, "Do you remember sitting downstairs listening to that fight he had with Francine about how he was going to go find me? Well, that same guy is sitting over there not even acknowledging I'm in the room most of the time. We used to joke about being like Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and now he doesn't even look up when I call him that. He just stares at his papers and mutters about precision and success and following orders. And he keeps talking about basements and rats and dreams about falling and jungles. Nothing makes sense."

"Falling?" said Efraim, perking up. "Not sinking?"

Amanda stared at him. "Well, no, but he says it's like he's falling slowly through clouds but it's not cold, it's hot and humid like a jungle."

"I've been having those exact same dreams, Amanda. That can't be coincidence."

"No, it can't be," she breathed out almost in a whisper. "But what's causing them?"

"Do you remember when I said I thought someone was coming in my room at night? Stetson said that too right?"

"Yes he did – do you think it means something?"

"It must. Do you think you could –". He stopped abruptly as Billy Melrose walked in the room. He was suddenly overwhelmed with a wave of rage that rushed up and then, almost as suddenly, drained away, leaving him with a pounding heart and cold clammy feeling over his entire body as if he had just escaped something terrifying.

"Sorry, I haven't been in to check on you, Efraim but Internal Affairs has been keeping us all hopping trying to figure out just what the hell happened to Walt. How's the head?"

"Sore," he managed to get out, still struggling to slow his heart rate. "Not as bad as the elbow, but you know, they almost cancel each other out."

"How are you doing Amanda?" asked Billy genially. "Lee still giving you grief?"

"Well sir, we were just discussing that," she exchanged a troubled look with Efraim. "Maybe you should come see for yourself."

As she got up and started to follow Billy out of the room, Efraim hissed to get her attention. "Amanda, when you come back, try and get our charts from the nurses' station." She nodded to show she'd understood and then quickly headed for Lee's room.

She walked in and felt her jaw literally drop. Lee was smiling and joking just like his old self. The papers were tidied away and stacked on the bedside table. There was absolutely no outward evidence of any of the things she'd described to Efraim not ten minutes before.

"No, I'm doing great, Billy. I guess I'm getting used to hospitals – and there's a really pretty nurse so that's a bonus."

Amanda opened her mouth to comment on how Lee had sent that pretty nurse scurrying out of the room almost in tears that morning, but decided it wasn't worth it if she could keep him in the good mood he was in now.

"And lucky break that it's Amanda's week to volunteer at the hospital too," Billy went on, repeating the story they'd cooked up to keep Lee from realizing he was being babysat. "So at least you have company."

Only Amanda noticed the way his face went completely blank and his eyes went dead when Billy mentioned her name. "Yeah, that too," he answered robotically, not looking in her direction at all.

"How are you sleeping?" Billy asked. "Amanda said you were complaining about that." He really couldn't understand what Amanda was worried about. Lee seemed just fine to him, but for some reason, Amanda was standing in the doorway, rocking on her heels and looking like she'd rather be anywhere but here.

"Oh, it was bad the first night with my knee, but I slept like a log last night."

Amanda couldn't hold in the squeak of disbelief. "That's not what you said when I got here this morning," she muttered when both men turned to look at her.

"Oh that," said Lee waving a hand dismissively. "I was just grumpy because I hadn't had breakfast yet."

Amanda couldn't disguise her shock. She turned to look at Billy but he just looked back and shrugged. It seemed like a perfectly reasonable explanation to him – everyone knew Lee was grumpy when he didn't eat.

"But you never eat breakfast," she protested. "And you didn't eat breakfast because you threw most of it at that pretty nurse you just talked about."

"You're exaggerating, Mrs. King," said Lee stone-faced. "I was joking around and I just underestimated how far I could toss a muffin."

She'd had enough. She had watched Lee whip that muffin at the back of Kimmy's head like someone trying to hit the bulls-eye on a dunk tank and now he was convincing Billy that everything was perfectly normal. "Well, I don't think she saw the humour in it," she said shortly and walked out of the room.

She went to the nurses' station and waved until she got Kimmy's attention. The nurse walked towards her with an expression of dread, as if she thought Amanda was going to ask her to do something for Lee. Instead, she leaned across the counter and said in a confidential tone. "Remember how this morning I asked you not to get Mr. Stetson in trouble because he was just acting up because he was frustrated?" Kimmy nodded. "Well forget everything I said. When his boss comes out, I want you to tell him every little thing Lee's done today, okay? If you need me, I'll be in talking to Mr. Beaman." She whirled and started to stalk off before stopping and turning around abruptly. With a quick glance to confirm Kimmy had turned away and couldn't see her, she reached over and grabbed the agents' charts from the rack and scuttled back to Efraim's room.

"Oh good, you got them," he said immediately as she entered.

"Yeah, but they'll notice they're gone any second."

"Not a problem. Just give 'em here," Efraim snapped his fingers at her urgently. He flipped open his chart and quickly ran a finger down the page, then the next one and the next. He handed it back to Amanda and then did the exact same thing with Lee's chart. "Okay, I got it all – you can go stick them back where they belong."

"Seriously? That's all it took?" Amanda sounded doubtful.

"Yes, that's all it takes, now go!" Efraim made a little shooing motion at her and she moved hesitantly back to the door. Sticking her head out, she could see Kimmy now had Billy cornered near Lee's room, gesticulating wildly and obviously really enjoying venting about her horrible patient. Amanda took the opportunity to sidle over to the desk and slide the charts back onto the rack, before heading back to Efraim's room.

"This is getting ridiculous. People are going to think we're having a thing," she muttered at him when she came back.

"A thing?" Efraim glanced up from where he was scribbling.

"You know – a _thing_."

"Oh – a _thing_ ," he repeated sarcastically. "Yeah, don't worry, nobody would believe that."

"Well, thank you so much," answered Amanda, equally sarcastic.

Efraim looked up, with a smile. "I meant no one could believe it when I was dating Francine. They're not going to believe that a second beautiful woman would look twice at me." He turned back to his notepad and continued writing.

"Oh." Amanda wasn't sure how to respond to that. "Uh, Efraim, please tell me you're not doing the crazy notes thing Lee is doing. I can't handle it if you're both crazy."

"Don't worry, I'm just plotting times, and I think I've figured something out. C'mere." He waved her over and pointed to the timeline he'd drawn out on the paper. "The nurses do regular rounds all night and make notations on the charts, right? So Stetson and I both have gaps where the nurses should have checked and there's nothing there. Our first night, someone checked him at midnight, but then there's nothing else until 3 am, and that same night, I'm checked every hour until 3 and then there's a two hour gap for me. Last night, he was checked at 11 and then nothing until 4. I got checked at 3, but then nothing until 5. Now it's not like our rooms are miles apart, so they must do all the rooms, but the only reason I can think of that they wouldn't make a notation is if we weren't there and they thought we were being charted somewhere else. Make sense?"

"Yeah, it does." Amanda stared at the paper for a moment. "But you're never gone at the same time. And Lee is gone for much longer."

"I noticed that too," agreed Efraim. "And where are we, if we're not in our rooms?"

They stared at each other for a moment, considering that thought.

"So want to hang out with me tonight and see what happens?" asked Efraim, finally.

"Damn right, I do."


	4. Day 3 - Night

Amanda snuck back into the hospital around nine that night, after putting the boys to bed. It was remarkably easy to convince her mother that a film studio had crazy hours where they needed help with things. She hadn't even questioned Amanda disappearing back to the office so late at night with only the vaguest promise of when she'd be home again.

Offense seemed like the best defense, so Amanda strolled onto the floor and greeted the nurses openly. "I'm sorry, Anna, I know it's past visiting hours, but I left my book in Mr. Beaman's room when I was here earlier and I'm just going to be in and out in two seconds."

"No problem, Amanda," the nurse on duty glanced up and smiled at her. "Must be quite the book if you had to come all the way back down here for it."

"Well, I was passing by on my way home from something else and I had just gotten to the bit where she finds out she was married to the hero in a past life – or at least it's her past life, but he's a time traveller so he's the same guy and he's been waiting for her to be reborn," Amanda said brightly, moving quickly past the desk.

"Wow – that sounds amazing. You'll have to loan it to me when you're done," answered Anna.

"Sure will!" said Amanda. _Right after I write it_ she thought as she slipped into Efraim's room.

"No problems getting away?" he asked.

"No, but I am getting way too good at lying to people. I never used to lie and now I have to do it all the time." She flopped in the chair by his bed and sighed. "On the upside, I may have a future as a romance novelist."

"Not spy novels?"

"Maybe romantic spy novels. Adventures of a time-travelling housewife spy from space – who wouldn't want to read that?"

"Any red-blooded male?"

Amanda gave a choke of laughter. "Fair enough. How have the check-ins being going?"

"Every hour, regular as clockwork. This is a very efficient hospital."

"Not so efficient that they don't let you get kidnapped nightly. Have you been able to figure anything else out?"

"Not from the charts, but I've been thinking back to everything since I got here. There's the sinking feeling thing, but I also had a really strange physical reaction to Billy walking in here today. It was like I was angry with him, and I really wanted to hurt him, and then in a split second, it was gone. I've never felt anything like it in my life – it was completely irrational. And you said Stetson was talking about precision and success and I can remember something like that, but here's the thing – I'm not _remembering_ it."

"You've lost me."

Efraim paused, searching for a good way to explain it. "The memories aren't _right_. There are things I remember clearly even if they're not important, like what you were wearing your first day, but these memories aren't like that, they're like – they're like photos of memories."

Amanda thought she understood. "So, like when you think you can remember stuff from when you were a kid but really it's because you've seen the pictures of it so much, you just think you do?"

"Yes! Well, I think so, but since I do remember stuff from my childhood, I'll take your word for it." He grinned at her eye roll. "Anyway, I'm getting really strange flashes of things like explosions that aren't right. And there's a voice – it's not a human voice, it's like a cartoon voice and it talks about precision and success and -."

"Details?" asked Amanda.

"Yes."

"Details are important," they both said it at the same time. Amanda stared at him wide-eyed.

"What are we in the middle of?" she whispered

"Somebody in this hospital is up to something bad and I'd bet my next paycheque Dr. Glaser has something to do with it." He checked his watch. "You need to go hide in the bathroom – Anna should be doing her rounds any minute now."

As she stood in the small bathroom, ear pressed to the slightly open door, Amanda couldn't help seeing the funny side of this serious situation. _Now I really feel like I'm having a thing_ she thought. _All we need now is for Francine to show up and find me hiding in here._

She listened as Anna joked quietly with Efraim before moving on to the next room. When she was sure she was gone, Amanda moved back out into the room and leaned against the window sill. "Now what Boss?"

"Now we wait."

She didn't realize she'd dozed off, curled up in the dark corner of the room where the nurses wouldn't notice her, until she heard Efraim calling her softly. "Whassup?" she asked sleepily.

"They're taking Stetson somewhere," he motioned to the door.

"Already?" she looked at her watch. "It's only 11 o'clock!"

"They're getting cocky, I think. Or speeding up whatever they have planned." He watched her move quietly to the door and open it slightly, peeking out to see what was going on.

"You're right," she whispered to him. "That was Glaser's assistant Dr. Chrysler." She peeked out again. "They're going to the service elevator." As Dr. Chrysler and the gurney with Lee on it disappeared from view, she crept out of the room and moved down the hall. "They've gone to the basement," she told Efraim when she returned a few seconds later.

"That explains the sinking feeling," he said with a grimace. "We need to find out what's down there."

"To heck with this, I'm following them," said Amanda. "And don't even bother telling me no. You can't go – you'll miss bed check."

"I'm not going to tell you no but don't do anything heroic. Just find out where they're going and come straight back here."

She walked quickly down the hallway and pressed the elevator button, praying that its noisy movement wouldn't attract any attention. The nurses must have been used to the noise though because they never even looked up when she opened the metal gate and stepped inside. The doors opened downstairs to a blast of heat and humidity and she realized she was on the same floor of the laundry, and more of what Lee and Efraim had been saying began to make sense. She tiptoed down the hall, diving to flatten herself against the wall in the dark hallway when Dr. Chrysler appeared out of a doorway and strode down the hall in the opposite direction. When she saw him pick up the handset of the phone on the wall, she moved quickly down the hall, her footsteps silenced by the noise of the heavy duty laundry machines. She slipped into the room and found Lee strapped into a chair, head lolling to one side. His eyes were open but when she ran forward to take his face in her hands, there was no recognition in them.

"Oh Lee," she murmured, trying not to cry. "What have they done to you?" She looked around wildly looking for a way to free him and then realized she could do nothing with Chrysler in the hallway. She went to the door, realizing just in time that he was walking back towards the room they were in. Spinning in place, she saw the supply closet in the corner and ran for it, praying he wouldn't find her in there. She pulled the door almost completely closed, then slid to the floor, wrapping her arms around her knees to try and keep from moving.

"He's ready to go?" She hadn't heard Glaser arrive but she recognized his voice immediately.

"Yes Sir, he's got enough serum in him for at least five hours."

"We shouldn't need it – he's more susceptible than Agent Beaman, although that loyalty to Billy Melrose is proving difficult to overcome." Amanda's head shot up at his next words. "And what the hell is Sundance? Is that his mantra word or something? Every time he gets over-agitated, he starts muttering how Sundance should be helping him."

"He used to have a partner, didn't he? Could that have been his code name?"

"That's possible," answered Glaser thoughtfully. "I wonder if we could use that. If we could persuade him that someone he trusts wants him to murder Melrose, he'd be putty in our hands."

Amanda closed her eyes, horrified by what she was hearing. It was taking everything she had not to jump out and try and stop them, but she knew she was horribly outnumbered, so she forced herself to sit still and listen.

"Pity Agent Beaman was such a washout as a test subject. I don't know how he can manage to shake off everything so easily. I thought his eidetic memory would make it easier but it actually appears to be an impediment."

"So you don't want me to bring him down next?"

"There's no point. We'll just use Stetson – after all, it's not like we can kill Melrose twice."

"And now that we've narrowed down what went wrong with Kimball, we can pinpoint his pressure points."

"Indeed we can. Let's get started."

Amanda stayed curled up in the closet, and tried not to cry as she listened to the nightmare unfold outside the door.

* * *

Efraim waited until midnight before he allowed himself to panic. She'd been gone too long – she was only supposed to see where they were going and come back. It was possible she'd stayed to spy on them, but she must have known he expected her back sooner than this. The night nurse had been surprised to find him still awake; she offered him a sleeping pill and he'd pretended to take it since he had no idea who was involved in whatever was going on. By 1 am, he had been trying to decide whether to go look for her himself or call for reinforcements, but when he unthinkingly rolled onto his bad elbow trying to get out of bed and almost passed out, the decision was made – he was in no shape to take on anyone.

Francine had answered on the second ring and despite the fact that she must have been sound asleep, she had instantly grasped everything he'd said and come without question. Now it was closer to 2 am and Francine, who had simply strode by the nurses waving her badge officiously to deter questions, was standing by his bed, getting him to repeat the strange story.

"So they've been gone almost three hours?"

"Since just after eleven. She told me the elevator with Stetson in it had gone to the basement. She followed a few minutes later and neither of them have come back."

"And you think Glaser and Chrysler are involved?"

"We know it was Chrysler who took Lee, so yeah."

"And you thought it was a good idea to let a civilian pursue someone who you suspected was capable of terrorizing trained agents?"

He winced – she was right and he knew it. "I know, I know! But she was here and it all happened so fast and…" he met Francine's grim look with shame. "No, it was a terrible idea and I should have called you sooner."

She didn't bother to answer him; she simply pulled out her service revolver, checked it quickly and tucked into the back of her jeans before walking towards the door. The instant she pulled it open, they both heard it – the sound of the service elevator gate being opened. She stepped back into the shadow of his room, holding the door slightly ajar to see who was coming.

"It's Lee," she whispered over her shoulder.

"No Amanda?"

"Nope. Is Chrysler the one with the glasses and the curly hair?"

"Yeah, that's Nurse Ratched. So what are you waiting for?"

"I'm waiting to see if he comes for you next. I can't just go arrest him – it's hardly a crime for a doctor to be moving a patient around a hospital, is it?" Francine could hear him moving and went on without turning her head. "Get back in bed, Efraim. You're no good to anyone with that concussion."

He didn't answer her – the wave of vertigo when he'd sat up too quickly had already convinced him not to move further.

"He's leaving." She stepped back, ready to hide behind the door but still watching through the small window. "And he's gone. If I'm not back in fifteen minutes, call the cavalry." She slipped out the door and down the hall.

The service elevator car had already disappeared but she could see from the moving cables in the shaft that it was returning. She moved to one side, waiting to see who was inside, then gasped with relief when Amanda stumbled out, clutching file folders and began staggering down the hall toward Efraim's room. She ran forward to grab her, worried Amanda was actually going to collapse before she got there. At the sound of her footsteps, Amanda whirled and pressed herself against the wall, sheer terror written all over her face.

"Francine!" she gasped. "Oh thank God! When did you get here?" Amanda practically fell into her arms and Francine guided her down the hall, half-carrying her until she could deposit her into a chair in Efraim's room.

Efraim had been relieved when he'd seen them reappear but now looking at Amanda, the guilt of having let her go after Lee was overwhelming. She was pale and shaking, clutching the folders she was still carrying. Francine had crouched down in front of her and was slowly peeling her fingers off them, talking to her in soothing tones.

"What happened? Are you ok? Efraim says you've been gone for three hours."

Amanda looked up at that and answered in a shaky voice, "Only three? It felt longer."

"So where were you? And what have you got there?"

Amanda sounded as if she was trying to gulp in air desperately. "Glaser's files on Walt and Efraim. I stole them. I would have taken Lee's but they said they weren't done with him and I thought they'd notice if it was gone but they don't want Efraim anymore and Walt is dead and they wouldn't need them so I thought they wouldn't notice." Even for Amanda, it was a pretty incoherent ramble.

Francine took the files from her and laid them on Efraim's bed before going back to Amanda again, still speaking in a soft voice. "Okay, that was good thinking. So where have you been? Where did they take Lee?"

Amanda was very obviously trying not to cry by this time. "They have a room on the basement. I got stuck. I was trying to get Lee out of there and they came back and I had to hide in the closet and then I knew I couldn't come out or they'd know I was there and maybe they'd do it to me too."

"What were they doing?"

Amanda swallowed hard. "They'd drugged him and they were playing him these films and these tapes kept repeating and it was telling him that Billy was the enemy and at first he was fighting it but then…" she trailed off, eyes closed.

"What happened, Amanda?" Francine's voice was still soft but firmer now – she knew she needed to keep her talking.

"When he started to fight it, they started telling him I wanted him to do it. I mean, not me, but Sundance – they thought when he kept asking for Sundance to help him that it must be Eric's old code name – so they kept telling him Sundance wanted him to kill Billy because he could only save his partner from the rats if he killed Billy. It was so awful - he was so frightened and I couldn't do anything." All of a sudden, Amanda was on her feet, bolting for the bathroom, where they could hear her retching uncontrollably.

Francine turned to look at Efraim, and he knew the horrified look on her face was on his too before she followed Amanda into the small ensuite. He began flipping through the files, his own bile rising as he looked over the clinical notes of what they had done to Walt Kimball and tried to do to him. It was almost a relief to see that he wasn't actually crazy, that it wasn't the concussion that had been affecting him over the past few days and that there was an explanation for his reaction to Billy that afternoon.

He looked up as Francine led Amanda back out and into the chair. She motioned for him to keep an eye on her before leaving to check on Lee.

"He's out cold," she announced on her return. "Whatever they gave him, I can't wake him up." After a quick glance at Amanda, who was rocking gently in her chair, head in her hands, she came to see what was in the files.

"You need to take these to Billy asap," said Efraim, quietly. "This whole thing is a targeted attack on the Agency and specifically him. It looks like Glaser is trying to prove the validity of his old theories by targeting the people who got him tossed."

"I thought you couldn't hypnotize somebody to do something they don't want to do?"

"This isn't hypnotism though, it's more like he's trying to rewire our brains. There's stuff in here about a trigger phrase – no pun intended – I think that's the weird voice I keep hearing in my head."

"At least we know that with Lee in the hospital, he can't actually act on any of the stuff Amanda says they were doing to him," answered Francine, quickly scanning the pages Efraim was pointing out. "Poor Walt – it looks like he never stood a chance. He was set to self-destruct." She reached for the other file, tugging it out of Efraim's reluctant grip. "Give me a break, you know I'm going to read it anyway." She sped-read her way through the notes, looking up at the end with a grimace. "Must be nice to know your steel trap mind has good taste in what it retains. Nice for Billy too – we'd never have figured this out otherwise."

"It was Amanda mostly – if she hadn't known something was wrong with Stetson, I would have just put it all down to bad dreams."

"Well, this is definitely a nightmare." She leaned against the side of the bed, watching Amanda thoughtfully for a moment. "Okay, I'm going to take her home and then get all this back to the Agency so I can have it all ready to brief Billy in the morning. We know Lee can't go anywhere, so I don't think there's a safety issue in not dealing with it until tomorrow."

She walked over and crouched in front of Amanda again. "I'm going to drive you home to get some sleep, Amanda, okay?"

"No, I can't leave! What if they come for him again?" Francine could hear the panic rising in her voice.

"It's fine. They're gone for tonight and he's sleeping. You need to go home because your family is expecting you, right?" Amanda nodded unwillingly. "But we'll need you back at the office in the morning because Billy will want to talk to you. Can you do that?" She waited for another nod then helped her to her feet. She glanced back at Efraim as they walked to the door.

"And McMurphy, you stay out of trouble until I can come back, okay?"

He gave her a grim smile. "Oh, I'm not going anywhere, Martini. I always prefer to get in trouble with you anyway." At least he'd managed to make her laugh a little bit in the middle of all this.


	5. Day 4 - The Cuckoo's Nest

Somehow Efraim wasn't even surprised when Amanda was back first thing in the morning.

"Did you even sleep?" he asked incredulously.

"I got in a few hours, and then I got the boys off to school and grabbed a cab to come back here." She gave a short laugh. "Although I have to admit, I was still tired enough to have a heart attack when I walked out and my car wasn't in the driveway – I'd forgotten Francine drove me home."

"Isn't she expecting you at the Agency this morning?"

"I called before I left the house. I just had to come check on him before I go down there – I kept having dreams about being stuck in that closet and not being able to save him and all I could think about was how he showed up like a white knight that day at Honeycutt and when it was my turn I just hid in the dark. "

"The situations were a bit different, Amanda. That Davenport guy was just a creep – these guys were playing hardball, they would have hurt you."

"My head says that, but my heart… He was asking for me to help him and I couldn't do anything." she sighed. "Anyway, I'm going to go sit with him for a while. I just wish I knew which Lee I'm going to get today."

She got a surprisingly calm Lee, which should have been a relief but wasn't. He was still calling her Mrs. King as if they'd just met, but at least he wasn't throwing things at the nurses and he'd stopped with all the odd tics of the last few days. She knew from the night before that Glaser had told him he had to behave as if everything was normal in order to get close to Billy so none of this surprised her but she wondered if Billy was going to believe anything they said if he saw Lee like this, with no outward sign of anything being wrong. _No, I can take them to the lab and show them,_ she thought, _they'll have to believe it then_.

She tried to control her shock when Glaser walked in, full of good cheer and looking not at all as if he'd been up late torturing Lee. She waited for Lee to have some kind of reaction to him, but there was nothing. Not the dislike he'd shown him on the first day and none of the fear from last night – that was the most unnerving thing yet. She tuned back in to hear what Glaser was telling him.

"I'm done with all your tests, so I'll be signing the release forms for you this afternoon and you should be able to go back to work tomorrow. You'll still be off most active field duty of course with that ligament damage but I'm sure Mr. Melrose can find you something interesting to do around the place, hey Lee?"

"I can get out of here? I can go back to work? That's great!" The level of enthusiasm was almost like the old Lee. "Isn't that great? You won't have to babysit me anymore," he added turning to Amanda.

"I didn't realize you were a friend of Lee's, Mrs. King" said Glaser suddenly turning his icy gaze on her. "I thought you were just a hospital volunteer."

Amanda shrunk back involuntarily. "Well, I am a hospital volunteer, but I, uh, I've known Mr. Stetson socially for a few months."

"And at work," added Lee, very unhelpfully Amanda thought.

"You work at the Agency?" Glaser was a lot more interested in her now.

"Just in the steno pool," squeaked Amanda, heart racing. "I just get the coffee and type up expense reports really." She laughed nervously, hoping Glaser couldn't actually hear her pounding heart.

"Well, I'm sure it's a lot more interesting than you make it sound," said Glaser genially before turning back to Lee. "So I'll see you later today before you're discharged, Lee."

Amanda watched Glaser leave, then turned to Lee. "I thought you didn't like him. You were pretty rude to him the first day," she started out tentatively.

"Well, I was just in a bad mood after being hit by a car, Mrs. King. I'm sure he's really an ok guy."

If it hadn't been for the 'Mrs. King', he would have sounded completely reasonable.

"Didn't you have something to do with him not working at the Agency anymore? You and Mr. Melrose?" And there it was – the shutter came down over his eyes the moment she mentioned Billy's name. She couldn't help it- she went on in a rush. "Lee, you don't have to do this. You don't have to hurt Billy. He's your friend. You don't have to hurt anybody. Please don't."

His face went stony. "You don't know what you're talking about. He's not my friend."

"Of course he's your friend!" she said desperately. "Remember how worried he was when he came to rescue us from Bouchard that day? Remember how he let you talk him into letting me start late so I could go on the school trip? You got hit by the car because you pushed him out of the way – if he wasn't your friend, why would you have done that?" As she'd been talking, she'd moved forward and now laid her hand on his arm. He stared at her hand, then back up at her face and for a few seconds, she could see it – she could see him struggling to get free from his demons, but then he spoke.

"Billy Melrose is the problem. I need to solve the problem." He shook his arm free from her hand, pulling away across the bed.

"Lee! He's not! He's your friend!" she went to grab his arm again, trying to get through to him, but in a split second, he had pulled it back further, pulled it all the way back in fact as if he was preparing to hit her. She looked at him, seeing the same expression he'd had that day in Warren Davenport's office. She jumped back, really frightened for the first time.

"He's not my friend," he snarled – it was the only way she could describe it.

"Well, I am," she tried again, trying to be brave although she was careful not to move close to him again. "And I'm not going to let you do this." They stared at each other for a moment and when she thought she could see an expression of doubt in his eyes, she took a tentative step forward. Immediately, his panic returned and his arm started to swing back again.

She recoiled, her hands coming up protectively this time. "I am not going to let you do this!" she snapped again and then she spun on the spot and ran out of the room.

As the door swung silently shut, she never heard him calling out in a breaking voice. "Amanda?" Lee stared at the door, overwhelmed with confusion, his head pounding, and incomprehensibly bereft as he lost sight of her.

Amanda raced into Efraim's room, skidding to a stop halfway from the door. "Call Francine! They're releasing Lee today and he's probably going straight to the Agency to find Billy."

"What? Who's releasing him? Where are you going?" That last question as she turned to leave the room again at high speed.

"I'm going to go get something and then I'm going to the Agency and help stop that damn Dr. Glaser." She was gone before he could say anything to stop her.

* * *

The basement was still eerily unpopulated. There was no one to see her sidle down the corridor and quietly open the blue door into Glaser's nightmare factory. With a quick check to see if anyone was around, she darted into the room and pulled open the file drawer she'd raided the night before. Lee's file was right at the front and she hurriedly yanked it out and flipped it open to make sure Glaser's notes from the night before were there. Assured that it contained all the proof she needed, she ran for the door but as she slowly pulled it open to check the hallway, she found herself being pushed backwards into the room by Dr. Glaser, who was holding a lethal looking scalpel in his hand.

"Just a girl from the steno pool, you say? I think not, Mrs. King. Now what do you have there?" He pulled the file out of her hand and glanced at the label. "Oh dear, this is going to play havoc with your security clearance, being caught stealing classified medical information from an Agency facility."

"This isn't an Agency facility," spat out Amanda angrily. "This is just some kind of torture chamber."

"Po-tay-to, po-tah-to," said Glaser grimly. "Either way, it's not going to matter because you won't be around to do anything about it."

She hadn't noticed that he'd been slowly backing her up until her legs hit the front of the chair and his free hand forced her to sit. His eyes never left her as he reached over to grab the face mask and turn on some kind of gas. When she made a move to run, he stepped closer and pressed the scalpel against her neck.

"This can be messy or clean, my dear, but one way or the other, you are going to put this mask on your face and breathe deeply."

"Will it kill me?" she asked desperately afraid.

"That would be telling. But which would you rather? Quick painless unconsciousness or a slow bleed out in that chair?"

She reached out shakily and took the mask from his hand.

"Excellent choice."

* * *

"What do you mean she's run off somewhere? Where?" Francine was shouting down the phone line at him. She was seriously ticked off, quite rightly he knew.

"I don't know where. She went to talk to Stetson and ten minutes later she was back looking like the hounds of hell were after her. She ran in, said to call you and tell you Stetson was about to be released and then said she was going to go and get something to stop Glaser and ran out again."

"Oh my God, she's doing something stupid, I just know it. I'm going to get Billy and we'll be there in twenty minutes."

"Try and be faster."

He hung up, then decided he could not just wait around. Maybe Stetson would be able to tell him something, he decided. Something had obviously happened when she'd gone to talk to him – hopefully he wasn't so zoned out that he wouldn't remember what. He sat up gingerly, testing the limits of his vertigo and was pleasantly surprised that it had subsided considerably overnight as he maneuvered his way out of the bed. _It probably helps that I wasn't getting doped up by Glaser last night_ , he thought. He grabbed the robe that was on the chair and pulled it on carefully over his injured arm as he headed for the door. He opened the door, its well-oiled hinges giving no hint of his presence to the two men standing just outside as he froze in place.

"No, she's seen everything – we'll need to get rid of her," Glaser was saying to his assistant in a ferocious whisper. "Go get the van and meet me at the loading dock. I'll bring her out that way and we can deal with her somewhere else where there's less possible witnesses."

"Is it going to be a problem to get her out quietly?" Chrysler sounded unnerved by this latest twist in their plot.

"No, she's incapacitated. No one will notice a thing," answered Glaser grimly. "Now go – I'll be there in fifteen minutes."

As the two doctors took off in opposite directions, Efraim realized that waiting for Francine was going to take too long – he was going to have to go find Amanda himself and right away if she was going to survive. He shuddered to think what "incapacitated" might mean to someone like Glaser; he just hoped it wasn't already too late. He looked down the hall speculatively. He knew it was a long shot that Stetson would even help him but he had nowhere else to turn for backup until Francine brought the cavalry. He shrugged mentally and headed towards Lee's room.

It was the first time he'd seen Lee for himself – he seemed coherent but confused as he listened to Efraim asking for help. He figured appealing to his loyalty would work – Lee was hardcore Agency so he'd want to do the right thing, he hoped - but Lee was turning argumentative.

"Stetson, listen to me! You need to come help me. Glaser is trying to bring down the Agency. He's trying to hurt our friends. He killed Walt Kimball, but we can stop him. Come with me and stop him before he does anything else." He felt his spirits sag when Lee began to repeat the rote answers.

"No, it's Billy that's the problem! If I can just get rid of him, that will solve the problem. Success comes one step at a time."

Efraim grabbed him by his shoulders, ignoring the rush of pain that ran up from his elbow. "Scarecrow! Listen to me! Billy is not the problem! Glaser is the problem! He's been messing with your head and planting stuff in it. But you have to listen to me! Glaser has Amanda! He's taken her somewhere and she needs our help! He's going to hurt her!" With some relief, he began to see something in Stetson's eyes that wasn't the distant look.

"Amanda? What do you mean he has Amanda? She left ages ago." Lee tried to shake off Efraim's grip. "You're just trying to distract me."

"No, I'm not!" snapped Efraim. "She was supposed to go to the Agency but she never left. Glaser has her and she's in trouble. Now are you going to help me find her?"

"Amanda's in trouble?"

"Yes, Amanda's in trouble and I'm going to go find her. Are you coming?" He watched as his words finally began to sink in, although he could see Lee was still fighting the brainwashing.

"Okay, I'm coming," he finally said. "Where do you think she is?"

"Glaser has a lab in the basement, so we're going to start there."

"I don't want to go in the basement! There's rats in the basement!" Lee was getting frantic again and Efraim knew he was holding on by a thread.

"Stetson, we have to go down there! That's where he's been doing his experiments on us! You don't want him doing experiments on Amanda do you?" It occurred to him that the best way to break down Lee's delusions was to chip away at them by appealing to his protective instincts. "She told me how you rescued her from her last boss. Davenport, right? She said you came in like a white knight – don't you think she's expecting you to do that again?"

Lee's shoulders slumped in defeat. "Yeah, okay. I'll go with you."

"Alright, now we can't just wander down there dressed like this or someone will stop us for sure. So I'm going to go down the hall and create a diversion and I want you to sneak into the storage room and steal a couple of sets of scrubs, okay? Then we can get off this floor and downstairs without anyone looking at us twice. Are you with me, Butch?"

It had been an impulse to use Amanda's nickname for him but he could see with relief that it had somehow brought more clarity to Lee's fogged mind and that he was fighting the compulsion to leave and find Billy. "Yes," he said. "I'm with you."

Efraim wasn't sure if Lee would hold it together long enough to remember what he was supposed to do, but the threat to Amanda seemed to have sharpened his focus and the diversion and storage room theft went without a hitch. Within ten minutes they were changed and sneaking into the elevator. As he pulled the metal gate closed with a clang and the elevator started off with a slight dropping feeling, he felt himself break out in a cold sweat and a wave of nausea hit him. He looked over to see Lee looked equally ill.

"See Stetson, this is where Glaser brought us. It's not real, none of it's real," he said encouragingly.

"No rats?"

"No rats. They'd never have a rat problem in a hospital, right? Glaser was just messing with you. We need to stop him before he does that to anyone else, right?"

"Right." Lee was still looking pale but the look of panic in his eyes had diminished. Efraim prayed they'd find Amanda soon – she was the only one who was going to be able to get Lee off this mental ledge.

The elevator shuddered to a halt in the basement and as the door opened, Efraim could smell the familiar scent of bleach and steam and steeled himself against the false memories. He pulled open the metal gate and stepped out, almost surprised that Lee followed him. Taking that as a good sign that he was fighting the implanted compulsions, Efraim motioned that they should start working their way down the hall. Their footsteps were masked by the sounds from the laundry room – in fact almost all other noise was.

"No wonder he works down here," he said to Lee. "No one would hear a damn thing." Lee nodded and then stopped abruptly, pointing to the blue door they'd just started to pass.

"Blue door," they chorused in identical whispers. It seemed like every echo of the unnerving dreams they came across in real life made it clearer in their heads that it really was Glaser that had been baiting them. Lee's glazed look was almost entirely gone now and he was getting flushed with what Efraim hoped was invigorating anger. They could suddenly hear screaming and the sounds of a struggle and he was just leaning forward to turn the doorknob when the door was flung open and Amanda tried to run out, her hands tied together in front of her. The expression of relief on her face when she saw them standing there had barely appeared when a hand appeared from behind the door, and grabbed her by the hair, dragging her back into the room, screaming. Glaser sent her flying backwards. Efraim watched in horror as Amanda hit the far wall and slid into a heap on the floor. There was a scream of pure rage beside him and he turned to look at Lee. It was almost like a magic trick the way he could see the last of the veil lift from his face, all Glaser's midnight work undone as Lee launched himself at the doctor, spinning him around and laying into him with a series of well-aimed punches, a string of curse words accompanying the punches in rhythm.

Certain that Lee had Glaser well in hand, Efraim raced past them to undo the ropes around Amanda's wrists and then began trying to revive her but had barely started before Lee pushed past him and leaned down to scoop her up.

"You stay here with him. I'm taking her up to the emergency room," he snapped.

"We're in a hospital Stetson, we could call for help from here."

"It'll take longer to explain where we are than to just take her there."

Efraim couldn't fault his logic, especially when he was so glad to get a rational thought from him. "You're feeling alright?"

"I've never felt better in my life."

"Can you manage on that leg?"

"Probably not, but better than you can with that arm."

"Fair enough."

Efraim followed him to the elevator, pulling open the metal gate and pressing the floor button before stepping aside to let Lee limp in. He pulled the gate closed again and waited until the elevator had lurched into motion upwards before turning back to deal with the unconscious doctor.


	6. Day 4 - Butch and Sundance

Amanda came to slowly, unable at first to compute the motion and the feel of arms around her body. She fought to get her eyes open and found herself looking up at Lee whose head was tilted back against the wall, eyes closed wearily, pain etched on his face.

"Well, hello Ensign Mayo," she muttered, still half out of it.

Lee opened his eyes and looked at her confused. "I'm not an ensign."

"What? No, he's a guy in a movie. You're –." It all suddenly came back in a wave to Amanda and she began to struggle to get away from him, terrified.

"Put me down! Where are you taking me? Please don't do this, please don't. You don't have to do this – Glaser's been experimenting on you, none of it is real and you don't need to do this."

"I do need to do this and I'm not putting you down until we get where we're going." His eyes had closed again, as he concentrated on not dropping her.

Amanda switched to a wheedling tone, still trying to escape from his iron grip. "But your leg must be killing you. I mean, not that I'm not enjoying the role reversal because usually I'm the one picking you up off the floor and at least this time, I won't have to explain what happened to my clothes but I really don't need –".

"Sundance?" Lee interrupted her without opening his eyes. "Can you please just stop talking? I'm not going to put you down until I have handed you over to a doctor."

He hadn't actually expected her to be quiet so the ensuing silence was unnerving. When he heard a quiet sniffle, he finally opened his eyes enough to peer down at her. To his shock, she was crying – tears streaming down her face as she lay unmoving in his arms. Without stopping to think, he lowered her to stand on her feet and began running his fingers over her head and arms, trying to find an injury that would explain the crying.

"Amanda? Are you okay? Are you hurt? It's okay, we're almost there."

"I'm not hurt," she said in a small voice, one hand reaching out to pat the front of his scrubs. "I'm happy. You called me Sundance."

"Okaaay." He wasn't sure what to do next – crying women were among his least favourite things. "Um, you don't usually cry when I call you that."

"I do when you've spent the last 48 hours calling me Mrs. King."

"I've what?"

The elevator stopped and Lee moved forward to open the doors, trying desperately to remember the last few days. As they stepped into the busy hallway, they found Francine looking around, the panic behind the mask only obvious to her friends. The agent mask slipped as she saw them walk towards her and the relief swept over her face.

"Oh my god, where have you been? There's half a dozen agents combing this hospital looking for the three of you!" She stopped then, craning to look past them. "Where's Efraim? Isn't he with you?"

"He's down in the basement with Glaser," answered Lee. "Down the elevator, turn left, blue door. Mad scientist lab, you can't miss it."

"You left him alone with Glaser? What if Glaser tries to overpower him? He only has one good arm to defend himself!"

"I had to take Amanda to get checked out and believe me, Glaser won't be going anywhere for a while. In fact, you can probably tell Billy to get a head start on my reprimand now."

"Oh gosh – Billy!" Francine pulled out her radio as she darted around them on her way to the elevator. "Billy, meet me in the basement! Ef – Agent Beaman is holding Glaser down there!" They could hear the radio continue to squawk with chatter as the elevator doors closed.

Lee took Amanda by the elbow and began to guide her slowly down the hall towards the emergency room, gasps of pain coming every time he put weight on his leg.

"You need to go back to your room and get off that knee," she said finally, tugging him in the direction of the main elevator. "You're doing more damage every second."

"No, you need to get checked out first. You went down like a sack of potatoes after you hit that wall," answered Lee stubbornly.

"Tell you what – how about we go back to your room and get you off that leg and then I'll ask that nice pretty nurse Kimmy to check me out in your room so you can see I'm alright. I mean, how are you going to come rescue me next time if you get invalided out of work with a bad knee?"

"Okay," Lee was too tired to fight her as he allowed her to redirect him. "Wait - I have a pretty nurse?"

The relief of getting Lee back coupled with the ridiculousness of the question sent Amanda into a fit of laughter. "Yes, Butch, you do. But the bad news is, you've been pretty horrible to her the last few days, so I wouldn't try flirting with her just yet."

"Aw shucks," he chuckled, shaking his head in mock disappointment. He glanced sideways at Amanda who was watching the numbers change above the elevator. She felt him looking and turned to smile at him, her dark eyes crinkled up. In that instant, it all came back in a rush – the last few days of fog and then the clarity that had come with the rage he'd felt when Glaser had yanked her backwards and the panic when she'd hit that wall and he'd seen the light go out of those eyes.

Her smile faltered for a second as that memory chased across his face and she put a hand on his bare arm, sending a little jolt of electricity through him. "Lee? Are you ok?"

He shook himself free of the memory and laid his other hand over hers where it still rested on his arm. "I'm fine. I just – well I don't think I'll be flirting with anybody for a while."

Amanda began to laugh as the elevator doors opened and she helped him inside. "Yeah right. You've said some crazy things the last few days, but that's the craziest one yet."

"Yeah, maybe don't tell Dr. Pfaff I said that," he answered. "He'll lock me up for another set of tests."

He was remarkably soothed by the sound of her laugh as she answered, "Oh believe me, none of us want that."


	7. Day 4 - McMurphy and Martini

Glaser had been showing signs of coming round, despite the beating Stetson had given him, so Efraim decided he'd be safer tied up somehow. Trying not to scream with pain, he braced himself to lift Glaser off the floor, heaved him into the chair, and did up the leather straps with a shudder. He stood back and admired the number Stetson had done on Glaser's face – his nose was a bloody pulp and both eyes were swelling shut already. He stepped away and tried to control the panicky feeling that came with being in this room by breathing deeply and concentrating on sorting out the images in his mind, deciding what was real and what wasn't. He slid down the wall to sit on the floor, realizing when he got there that his hands were sticky. He held them up and noticed for the first time that Glaser had bled all over him while he was moving him. He began wiping them off on the front of his scrubs, glad for the distraction. He heard a gasp in the doorway and looked up to find Francine standing over him, the same look of horror he'd seen that day they met on the Mall. He looked down at his chest then up again quickly, about to forestall the obvious question when she started in on him.

"Efraim! What are you doing down here alone? You are not even supposed to be out of your room! There are agents all over this building trying to find you like you're a bomb about to go off and now I find you crashed out in a basement room with a dangerous suspect and blood all over you! You're not even a field agent, you're an analyst – you are not supposed to be running around trying to catch bad guys!" Her voice had been rising steadily as she spoke, and by the end, she was shouting.

He didn't know why he felt he had to poke the bear – maybe Amanda was right. "Wow, you sound just like my mom did the time I fell off the porch roof."

Francine's lips tightened and she stomped forward to check on Glaser before turning back to face him. "I bet you landed on your head that time too. It would explain a lot." She gestured to his chest. "What did you do to yourself?"

"Still not bleeding, Princess."

"Efraim!" Somehow that had managed to tick her off even more. "I know blood when I see it! Don't even say it!" she added quickly as he opened his mouth.

"Well, it's not _my_ blood." He could see she was not much impressed with that answer either and decided to distract her. "Help me up, will ya?" For a split second he thought she'd done it on purpose, grabbing his bad arm to help him up, but the look on her face when he screamed said otherwise.

"Oh God, I'm sorry," she babbled. "Why didn't you stop me?"

"I thought we had a new rule where I don't say stupid things."

"Not when the stupid thing might cause you irreparable physical damage, you idiot!"

"How am I supposed to know which stupid things are allowed and which aren't?" His voice was rising to match hers now and he had to admit, it was kind of liberating to yell about one thing when you're frustrated about something else.

"Why are you yelling at me? If it involves an injury, you should know I want to hear about it!"

"You mean like when you told me about getting shot in the arm? You didn't think that maybe I would want to hear about that instead of just getting some cockamamie fight so you didn't have to go on a beach vacation with me where I'd see it?" Francine opened her mouth to respond and then closed it again, flushing.

 _Bingo_ thought Efraim.

"You seem to be getting overheated, Agent Beaman." She reached over to the metal tray and picked something up. "We should make sure you're not running a fever," she said as she jammed something under his tongue and stared at him, arms crossed, as if daring him to say anything.

Efraim stared at her for a moment, rolling it back and forth in his mouth, before squinting down at it thoughtfully. "You know," he said finally, "that this is a Bic pen and not a thermometer right?"

"Yes," she admitted frostily. "I just wanted you to stop yelling at me and I thought it would make you shut up."

He pulled the pen out of his mouth and waved it at her. "I'm yelling at you because Amanda said you deal with things by fighting with people about different stupid things and the sooner we can stop fighting about different stupid things, the faster I can go get something for my head which is killing me!"

"Oh," said Francine looking stunned. "Fine."

"Oh my god" said a weary voice across the room. "How did either of you ever get past the psych tests for the Agency? You're both certifiable, you know that, right?"

"Look who's talking," snapped Francine, spinning in place and glad to have a new target. "You're the one conducting Dr. Frankenstein experiments." She picked up one of the syringes off the steel tray by the chair. "What is this stuff anyway?"

"A very clever combination of truth serum and a hallucinogen that makes you susceptible to suggestion for several hours," said Glaser smugly, although his smug expression was ruined somewhat by the bloody nose. "It would have been a great addition to the Agency's tool belt for interrogation but it's all up here – " His attempt to look clever was foiled by his forgetting his arms were strapped down when he went to tap his head. "And I'm not telling," he finished gamely.

"Really?" Efraim hid a grin at the way Francine was slowly twirling the syringe and staring at Glaser with a gimlet gaze.

"Oh don't go playing those techniques on me, young lady. I was studying those before you were born. And you and I both know you aren't about to use that because it would break a dozen Agency rules about handling suspects and evidence."

"Yes, but if you had actually been paying attention during my psych tests, you'd know I tested very high indeed on the loyalty and belief in justice scales."

"So?" sneered Glaser as she walked towards him.

"So, oops," she smirked at him as she drove the needle into the fleshy part of his thigh. "I tripped."

Glaser stared at her, a look of complete disbelief on his face. He turned his head to stare at Efraim who was now convulsed with laughter. "You saw that right?"

"You mean when she unfortunately tripped? Yes, I did."

Glaser's eyes were already getting cloudy. "Oh look," cooed Francine. "Glaser by name, glazed by nature." She leaned over him and tightened the straps another notch so the leather was biting into his wrists. "You hurt my friends," she hissed at him. "When you hurt my friends, I stop playing by the rules. And with your little potion inside, you are going to spill everything when we get back to the Agency and I am personally going to make it so unpleasant that you will have an embedded phobia of blondes for the rest of your life."

"Wow, I'm glad you're not mad at me," remarked Efraim watching with awe.

"Are you sure about that, Hopalong? You hurt my feelings yelling at me just then."

"I think I'm more like that guy in The Fugitive," said Efraim genially. "Stetson's got the Hopalong thing all sewn up." He could almost see the steam coming out of her ears, when they were interrupted by the arrival of Billy and a swarm of agents.

He kept out of the way, concentrating on a mental image of a Jamaican beach to fight the lingering impulse to murder his boss and watching Francine efficiently brief Billy and get Glaser dispatched on a stretcher.

"Good work, Beaman," said Billy finally, crouching down in front of him. "Thanks for not killing me." He gave a low chuckle at the look Efraim gave him. "Still fighting it, hey? Okay then, how about we get you back to your room and sedate you until Dr. Pfaff says you're over it?" He looked over his shoulder at Francine seeing off the last of the agents carrying boxes of evidence. "I'm going to leave Francine in charge of that, since I don't want to cause any problems with Internal Affairs by letting her interrogate Glaser." He went on in a confiding whisper. "I'm not buying that story about her tripping for one second, but it's sure going to make the interrogation easier"

"Mr. Melrose, I have an eidetic memory and I quite clearly remember her tripping," replied Efraim, calmly.

"Good for you," grinned Billy. "I'll expect to see that in your debrief." Efraim watched him walk over to Francine and have a quiet conversation with her, motioning in his direction a few times, before leaving to follow the other agents.

Francine walked back to him, lips pressed together, obviously annoyed that she was being deprived of her prey. She helped him to his feet, careful this time to grab his other arm. He followed her silently to the elevator, waiting until it was in motion before speaking.

"I don't suppose you kept that syringe you were holding when you tripped, did you?"

Francine gave him a sideways look, then stared straight ahead at the door again. "Of course, I didn't. It's in the evidence bag. Why?"

"Pity," he remarked casually. "I was hoping you were going to take me upstairs and talk me into something."

As much as she tried to hide it, her lips twitched and he started to grin. He reached out to take her hand and added in a coaxing tone, "Come on Frannie, let's go upstairs and compare war wounds. I hear there's a scar you've been meaning to show me."

"Damn, you sure know how to romance a girl, Beaman." But he noticed she'd linked her fingers with his.


	8. Day 5 - Life's a Bitch

"And furthermore, your reckless actions yesterday could have brought the Justice Department down on us like a ton of bricks!"

Mr. Belmont from Internal Affairs was not happy with Agents Beaman and Stetson and he was letting them know about it.

Lee and Efraim sat across from him at the table of the conference room, sinking lower into their chairs, looking more uncomfortable as the minutes passed and not just because of their injuries. They had both wangled discharges from the hospital that morning; Lee had his bad leg propped up on a chair after having limped in on crutches and Efraim had his arm in a sling which he kept shifting trying to find a comfortable spot, but none of these outward signs of injury seemed to have any effect on Belmont.

"And you put a civilian- a female civilian! – right in the line of fire!"

Efraim felt he had to interrupt at that point. "Well Sir, we didn't exactly put her anywhere– she kind of ran off and put herself there!"

"And would she have gone there in the first place if you hadn't encouraged her to help you investigate?"

"Well, no Sir, but she wasn't really supposed to investigate, Sir, she was only supposed to see what floor the elevator went to…"

"You haven't spent a lot of time with Amanda, have you?" Lee couldn't help himself. He caught the thunderous look on the IA Chief's face and wiped the smile off his face immediately and stared down at his lap.

"And you should talk, Stetson! You beat the suspect into such a pulp that his lawyers are going to have all their Christmases at once trying to get him lighter sentence because of Agency brutality."

"Well, I wasn't in my right mind, Sir, and I wasn't because of something he did, so…"

"I am well aware of that, Scarecrow, and that is the only thing that is keeping me from firing you right now."

Lee snuck a look at Efraim to see if he was going to bust him – if anyone knew he'd never been more in his right mind than at that moment, it was Beaman. Efraim was staring at a point somewhere over Belmont's head, looking like he was trying very hard to keep his face expressionless.

"And the only thing that is keeping you on the payroll right now, Agent Beaman, is the fact that you had least had the sense to call for backup before you so stupidly headed off to be a one-man rescue team."

"Two-man," muttered Lee with absolutely no sense of self-preservation.

Belmont turned back to him but before he could say anything, he gave off a sort of strangled noise of horror, staring at something behind the two of them.

"I'm sorry to interrupt, Sir, but I really think that if you should be yelling at anybody, it should probably be me," said Amanda apologetically from the doorway.

Lee and Efraim had both twisted around to see what had evoked that look on Belmont's face and felt their own jaws drop when they saw her. The left side of Amanda's face where she'd hit the wall was a mass of bruises and her eye was swollen almost shut.

"Ah, Mrs. King," said Belmont in strained tones. "We were just discussing you. You seem to have caused quite a ruckus yesterday." He couldn't seem to take his eyes off the injuries she'd sustained and Amanda's hand crept up as if to hide them for view.

"Yes, Sir, and I'm certainly very sorry about that. I just acted without thinking and I'm afraid I dragged Mr. Beaman and Mr. Stetson into it with me. Neither of them would have been involved at all if I hadn't been so foolish."

"But we wouldn't ever have known what Glaser was up to without Mrs. King's help," added Efraim, trying to keep her from taking all the blame. Amanda looked at him and for a split second, he could have sworn she was glaring at him.

"Ah, yes, well, that's true," stammered Belmont now entirely off balance.

"I mean, really they only got involved to save me. And I really wasn't thinking about endangering anyone – I was just concerned about Mr. Melrose and I just didn't think Dr. Glaser could be that dangerous since the Agency was still using him for their testing." Belmont went pale at this timely reminder that the Agency was also at fault for having exposed them all to Glaser's psychosis.

"I see. Well I think that given the unusual circumstances perhaps we could settle for two week suspensions for both of you," stammered the IA Chief. "Especially since you're both going to be next to useless around here for at least that long." His gaze found its way back to Amanda's face and he winced noticeably. "And Mrs. King, if you could just manage to stay out of trouble from now on, that would be most helpful."

"I'm sure I can, Sir." She had moved forward into the room and somehow Belmont missed her squeezing Lee's shoulder to keep him from making any kind of smart comment. "I hope Ms. Desmond will be getting a commendation for all her work – she was really instrumental in getting the Agency involved and rescuing all of us in time."

 _That's a bit of an exaggeration_ , thought Efraim, _but nice touch_.

"I want you two out of here in the next hour, but you will keep yourselves available for any questions that come up closing this case, is that understood?" Efraim and Lee both nodded. "Fine. Now Mrs. King, I am putting you on administrative leave for one week and I will now escort you out personally and make sure you don't end up dragged into a case between here and the front door."

"Yes, Sir," Amanda smiled gently at him. As he passed her on his way out the door, she leaned down and breathed into Lee's ear, "Meet us at Ned's."

Half an hour later, Lee and Efraim walked – or limped, in Lee's case – into Ned's to find Francine, Billy and Amanda sitting in a booth at the back. Amanda was facing away from them as Francine appeared to be tending to her face wounds. Billy waved them over, grinning at their dual looks of embarrassment at finding him there.

"Dr. Pfaff said it was safe for me to be around the two of you but you'll forgive me if I stick to public places for the first little while."

"Can't say I blame you," muttered Lee. "I'm really sorry, Billy-"

Billy held his hand up. "Don't worry about it. The lab says that serum of Glaser was the most lethal thing they've seen in years. No one can believe you fought it at all, let alone snapped out of it enough to help Beaman."

Lee slid gently into the booth after Efraim, wincing as he did so. "Well, Amanda had done a pretty good job of starting to rattle me free before Beaman came to get me."

The object of his sentence suddenly let out a loud "Ow!" across the booth. "Francine! Can you either do this gently or not at all?"

"Well, just hold still for two seconds and it wouldn't hurt so much!"

"Amanda, why didn't you tell me you were this badly hurt yesterday?" asked Lee, worriedly. "You seemed fine right after it all happened."

Amanda held up a hand and waved it at him. "I'm fine, don't worry about it, I just – ow!"

"Francine, what the hell are you doing to her?" Lee's voice was rising.

"I'm just getting the last of the…there!" With a flourish, Francine pulled her hand back and dropped something unrecognizable on the table. "K-9 squad strikes again."

Amanda lifted her hand to her face and rubbed it vigorously. "Oh my gosh, that feels so much better." She turned to face the rest of the table and Lee and Efraim's jaws dropped in unison. The puffy eye was gone and where there had been disfiguring bruising, there was now just very red skin. Amanda's eyes sparkled as she beamed at them.

"What the hell?" spluttered Lee.

"Nice make-up job, hey Scarecrow?" said Francine with pride. "I hear Belmont couldn't get out of there fast enough once he thought the civilian was the most injured person on a case."

"The whole thing was a fake?" Efraim leaned forward to study Amanda's face.

"Not entirely," admitted Amanda. "My cheek is actually pretty bruised from hitting the wall but nowhere near as bad as Francine managed to make it look."

"Yeah, it's kind of handy having gotten to know the Fabrication lab so well," chuckled Francine.

"And you knew about this?" Lee turned to look at Billy in amazement as his friend guffawed.

"Oh yes, although it was the two of them that came up with it," answered Billy between chuckles. "Belmont was ready to throw you both to the wolves this morning as damaged goods but the two of them cooked this up to – what did you call it?"

"Camouflage and Distract," answered Francine. "Camouflage all the ways you three broke the rules and distract him with worrying about lawsuits for letting Glaser loose on all of you. I hear it worked like a charm."

"It did," said Lee, reaching across to take Amanda's hand. "But could you let us in on it next time? You just about gave me a heart attack."

"Next time?" yelped Billy. "There will be _no_ next time, Scarecrow!"

Amanda turned to look at him, wide-eyed. "You mean I can't help anymore? I thought I'd been doing a good job!"

Billy looked flustered. "Well, you have Amanda, but you're not an agent and I really can't allow you –"

"You know, if Billy's going to be a problem with letting Amanda help out, I'm sure one of the two of you could have a relapse," quipped Francine. Three heads swivelled to stare at her, all with the same expression of disbelief. "Too soon?"

"Yes!" answered all three men.

"K-9 squad?" asked Efraim suddenly. "What's the K-9 squad?"

Francine and Amanda exchanged grins. "It's a sort of specialized internal unit. You know, like those Swiss mountain rescue dogs," answered Amanda finally.

"The ones that save people from their own stupidity?" Efraim was beginning to see the light.

"Exactly like that. You'd be surprised how often it's had to be mobilized."

Billy and Lee were looking back and forth between the other three, similar looks of confusion on their faces.

"How many members are in this unit?" Efraim was laughing openly now.

"Just two so far. It keeps the meetings short," said Francine, smiling. Amanda was wearing her most innocent expression - the one he'd learned to recognize in the last few days as the most dangerous. Both women lost it completely at his response.

"Uh-huh. But I bet the bitch sessions are great though."


End file.
